AI Model Distillation Engineer Salary.
Across 83 U.S. cities.
$192,000
national median salary
$145,000 to $252,000. Last updated April 2026.
Highest Paying
$273,000
San Jose, CA
Best Purchasing Power
$200,000
Newark, NJ
Lowest Paying
$145,000
Charleston, WV
Salary data sourced from SEC filings, H-1B Labor Condition Applications (DOL), Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, and aggregated job postings across 50+ platforms. Ranges reflect 25th to 75th percentile for full-time positions. Cost-of-living adjustments use Bureau of Economic Analysis Regional Price Parities (2025 index). Last updated April 2026.
The average AI Model Distillation Engineer salary in the United States is $192,000 in 2026, with the full range spanning $145,000 at the 25th percentile to $252,000 at the 75th. San Jose pays the most at $273,000, while Newark offers the best purchasing power after cost-of-living adjustments. Expertise in knowledge distillation, model compression, and efficient transfer learning drives compensation.
AI Model Distillation Engineer salary by city
Skills that increase AI Model Distillation Engineer pay
The skills below command measurable salary premiums for AI Model Distillation Engineers based on job posting data. Learning the top skill here could add $26,880 to your annual compensation.
≈ +$26,880 per year
≈ +$24,960 per year
≈ +$23,040 per year
≈ +$21,120 per year
≈ +$19,200 per year
≈ +$19,200 per year
≈ +$19,200 per year
≈ +$17,280 per year
What you should know
Expertise in knowledge distillation, model compression, and efficient transfer learning drives compensation. Engineers who can reduce large model sizes by 5 to 10x while preserving 90% or more of performance earn significant premiums of 12 to 20%. Experience with multi-teacher distillation, task-specific fine-tuning from distilled models, and deploying compressed models to edge devices adds further salary value.
ML engineers or research engineers earning $120,000 to $160,000 specialize into distillation roles at $145,000 to $252,000. Senior distillation engineers earn $195,000 to $275,000 before advancing to Principal Engineer or Head of Model Efficiency at $230,000 to $310,000.
Total compensation reaches $225,000 to $420,000 with equity, cost-reduction bonuses, and efficiency milestone incentives of 12 to 22% of base. Companies focused on on-device AI and edge deployment offer the strongest packages for this specialization.